Extra Tcat bar showing/nav bar image buttons

[TheAllusionist]

I am putting together a new theme to match a new main site I am about to launch and as I am working out the kinks I have one that is baffling me. I have a rogue catagorie bar at the top of my forum and I can't find where it is coming from. It is not in my other themes just this one. Can anyone point me to the template I should search for. Heads up, I am not a coding guru, rather trial and error Refer to attached link.

secondly since I have had to match the left hand side color with my left side vertical nav bar, I want to use an image on the legacy horizontal bar I am modifying so that login etc. are still obvious to people. What kind of code/formating do I use for a nav bar image rather than the default color set. Would go here (This may only effect a bar under the nav bar?), if so, not certain of the correct syntax:

<!-- / Start nav buttons bar -->
<br />
<table class="tborder" cellpadding="$stylevar[cellpadding]" cellspacing="$stylevar[cellspacing]" border="0" width="100%" align="center">
<tr>
<td class="alt1" width="100%">
CONTENT HERE
</td>
</tr>
</table>
<!-- / End nav buttons bar -->

Or does it go above in table formate or is it per individual nav bar link?

<div align="center">
MODIFY THE NEXT LINE OR IS IT PER LINK?
<table class="tborder" cellpadding="$stylevar[cellpadding]" cellspacing="0" border="0" width="100%" align="center" style="border-top-width:0px">
<tr align="center">
<if condition="$show['member']">
<td class="vbmenu_control"><a href="usercp.php$session[sessionurl_q]">$vbphrase[user_cp]</a></td>
</if>
<if condition="$show['registerbutton']">
<td class="vbmenu_control"><a href="register.php$session[sessionurl_q]" rel="nofollow">$vbphrase[register]</a></td>
</if>

What I need is a button or graphics on the nav bar above and it doesn't seem like a background=FILENAME will work for this, wondering what code/syntax is necessary and where to add it for the nav bar buttons themselves.

Thanks in advance for your time, trial and error just isn't cutting it.